


A Proper, Wild Northern Lady

by sunkelles



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms
Genre: Bullying, Fluff, Gen, Mother-Daughter Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-15
Updated: 2019-06-15
Packaged: 2020-05-12 13:25:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19230013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunkelles/pseuds/sunkelles
Summary: After being called "Arya Horseface" by Jeyne Poole, Arya and her mother have a heart to heart and Catelyn takes over some of Arya's lessons herself.





	A Proper, Wild Northern Lady

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. holy shit. i've written so little this year that working up this little fic in a day feels like a gift from god.  
> 2\. i saw a comic a few days ago of arya wearing a dress and trying to be a proper lady and then the arya horseface scene happening and arya running away to cry with jon and it made me think. what if arya WASN'T totally opposed to the whole lady thing on principal. what if, at least part of it, was lady things being ripped away in much the same way that femininity was ripped away from brienne. brienne who wants to be a soft maiden and true knight and isn't allowed to be either  
> 3\. i don't know, that made a lot of sense in my mind that maybe arya COULD like some of these things if she wasn't constantly shot down, especially if she had some special attention from her mom. mainly i just wanted to write catelyn loving on her younger daughter and being Very Much Herself in the process. hope you enjoy some stark ladies <3

Catelyn always walks by her children's rooms around bedtime to check on them. It's mainly to ensure that they actually go to bed (which it doesn't tend to do) and check to see if anyone needs help, which they don't tend to need. Tonight, though, Catelyn thinks that might be different. She hears a noise that sounds like crying coming from Arya's room. Her door is close to closed, but not quite, so Catelyn opens it up and comes in. She closes it gently behind her so that none of the rest of the family hear their conversation. Whatever this is about, she doubts Arya wants her siblings to hear about it. 

"Arya," Catelyn says, "why are you crying?" Arya stifles a tiny little sob and looks away.

"It's nothing" she says, but the sound gets caught up in her throat. Catelyn walks over to and takes her firmly by the shoulders. Then she looks in her teary, grey eyes. 

"This isn't nothing, sweetling. Please tell me what's wrong." 

"Jeyne Poole- she called me- Arya Horseface!" She rushes forward, burying her face into her mother's shoulder. Within a few moments, it's wet with tears. Catelyn couldn't have heard that right.

"She called you what?" 

"Horseface," Arya repeats. Catelyn's blood boils in her veins. 

"That vile little wretch," Catelyn says, anger bubbling to the surface, "how dare she speak of you in such a manner!" Catelyn holds tightly as she considers what to do. She'll have to have a talking to Vayon, let him know that his daughter's behavior is unacceptable. 

"You are the daughter of her lord and she will treat you as such," Catelyn says. 

"You don't have to tell dad," Arya says as she breaks out of the hug, tears still streaming, "or Lord Poole, or yell at Jeyne. I don't want her to get in trouble." Catelyn sends her a soft look. Arya is such a sweet girl. 

"Are you sure?" Catelyn asks, "she might not stop if I say nothing." Arya bites her lip. She looks like she wants to say something more. 

"Arya, what is it?" The girl looks reluctant to open her mouth again, but Catelyn's stern look makes her start. 

"Jeyne just said those things to make Sansa laugh," she says. Catelyn feels her heart sink. 

"Sansa said those things too?" Sisters aren't supposed to bully each other. She knows that Sansa and Arya haven't always seen eye to eye, but she didn't think it was this aggressive. And she didn't think it had gotten this far under her little wildling's skin. She'll need to have a talking to with Sansa later about how to treat her own sister. 

"She never called me Horseface, but she laughed," Arya says, another little sob getting caught in her throat, "and she always makes fun of my needlework, even when I try. And I'm no good at anything in our lessons. Septa always says so. She says I'll never be as good a lady as Sansa." Catelyn makes a mental note to have a talking to with the Septa. Clearly she's being too hard on Arya if she believes that she can never do the things that she's being taught. Arya has every capacity to be as good a lady as Sansa.

"Your Septa said that you're good at sums," Catelyn says. She's sure that she's heard that before. 

"That's the only thing I'm better at than Sansa." If that's _all_ that she's better at than Sansa, it's not the worst case scenario. Frankly, Sansa's lack of skill with sums is concerning. It's one of the most important skills for a ruling lady to have. 

"That's a crucial skill in running a household. I did all the sums at Riverrun and now I do all of them here at Winterfell." Arya nods. She seems assured by this knowledge, at least a little. Catelyn needs to find a way to build up her confidence. Clearly, her Septa isn't doing it herself. 

"Which other skill from your lessons do you like the most?" 

"I'm not good at any of them," Arya mumbles, looking at her toes. Catelyn pulls Arya close again.

"I didn't ask which one you were good at. I asked which one you like. Which skill do you want to get better at?" When phrased like that, it looks like the little wheels in Arya's brain start to turn. 

"I want to embroider like you," Arya admits. 

"Then I will give you embroidery lessons myself," Catelyn says, "if your Septa won't be patient with you, then I will myself." 

"But aren't you too busy?" Arya asks cautiously. 

"I can take an hour a day to embroider with my daughter, I would think," Catelyn says, and she presses a kiss to Arya's forehead. 

"Really?" Arya asks, "don't you have a household to run?" 

"You're my daughter. What's more important in the household than the children?" Arya's face lights up in a grin. Catelyn stands up and readjusts her skirts. 

"We will start tomorrow at midday in my chambers." Arya grins as she nods. Then Catelyn ruffles her hair. 

"You can be wild, but you can still be a proper Northern lady." 

 

 

 

 

Day by day, Arya improves at her embroidery. It takes practice and guidance, but her daughter is a good student when she has positive attention. 

At first she makes patterns that Catelyn sets, but then the first time that she makes her own design it's the initials JS. Catelyn turns her head and tries not to think about who that one will go to. 

After Arya finishes that and presumably gives it to the bastard, she starts work on a "secret" project. She won't let Catelyn so much as glance over her shoulder at it. 

"It's a surprise," she promises, "you'll love it." Catelyn nods. 

"Alright, sweetling, I won't look." Even though she's tempted, she doesn't look for the entire month and a half that Arya works on it. Then her daughter finally brings it up to her with the biggest smile on her face. She places it tenderly in Catelyn's hands.

The image is of the Stark sigil and the Tully sigil holding hands. It's a little crude, but each image is clear, and it's the sweetest present any of her children have ever given her. 

"It's a trout and a wolf holding hands," Arya says, pointing to it as if Catelyn wasn't already looking, "for you. Because you're a Stark and a Tully, and we are too!" Catelyn feels tears prickling her eyes. 

"Thank you, Arya. This is perfect." She pulls her daughter into a hug.

"So," Catelyn asks, "do you like embroidery now?" 

"I don't like embroidering much, but I like getting to do it with you." And there's a bigger smile on her face, then. 

"And I like making people gifts." 

"You know," Catelyn says, "you should make something for your father." Arya smiles at that. 

"I could make him one that says our house words," Arya says. 

"I'm sure your siblings would appreciate something as well," Catelyn suggests gently. Her true siblings, not the bastard Arya loves so much. 

"Sansa wouldn't like my embroidery," Arya mumbles. 

"I'm sure that she would love it. You two _are_ sisters, after all." When Catelyn was young, her relationship with Lysa meant everything to her, but over the years and the miles, the two have drifted further and further apart. She only hoped for Sansa and Arya to grow closer with age. At least she talked to Sansa about how she's not allowed to bully Arya anymore. Hopefully that's made a difference in their relationship. 

"Yeah, yeah, okay," Arya says. Their lesson time is coming to a close and Arya is getting antsy. 

"Can I go out riding now?" Arya asks, sending a pleading look out the window. Catelyn wishes that she could say no, but Ned allows her to take riding lessons with the boys and she can't exactly overrule that. 

"Alright," Catelyn says, "you can go." Arya nearly bounds out of the room, almost knocking down her stool. Catelyn can see the writing on the wall of how this day will go. 

"Don't ruin your dress!" Catelyn shouts. That's her favorite of Arya's dresses too.

"Yeah, yeah," Arya says, bounding down the stairway, which of course means that she'll only ruin her dress a little bit while riding through the countryside with her brothers. 

Catelyn sighs. Maybe someday Arya will grow out of this wildling phase, but for now, at least she's gotten passable at embroidery. And most importantly, she knows now that she can come to her mother for help. 


End file.
